


Untitled Drabble #4

by writinginthedust



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-06-01 08:58:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15139643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writinginthedust/pseuds/writinginthedust
Summary: Inspired by prompt ‘You just moved into the house next to my mom’s and she has you doing her yardwork’ AU. Cannot remember where the link is so cannot link to it!





	Untitled Drabble #4

At first Katniss thought it was the left-over remnants of a bizarre dream she couldn’t remember having. Or maybe it was a hallucination brought about by double shifts at Sae’s, shitty neighbours that wouldn’t stop partying and sheer exhaustion. Or just maybe her eyes weren’t deceiving her and she was seeing exactly what she thought she was seeing.

Taking a large gulp of her tea she tilted her head and pursed her lips before addressing the other occupant in the room. “Prim?”

Her sister’s voice carried over from where she was sat at the kitchen table to where Katniss stood by the sink. “Yeah?”

“There’s a guy in the yard.”

Katniss heard the spoon clang against the bowl and the crunch of cereal before Prim spoke, her mouth muffled from where she chomped her way through her Cheerios. “Yep.”

“It looks like he’s raking leaves.”

“Well if that’s what it looks like, then that’s what he’s doing.”

Katniss’ eyebrows shot up into her hairline. Such sass. Prim went off to college to earn her degree in medicine and it just seemed to Katniss that she was honoring in attitude. When did the baby turn into an adult? Katniss sighed. Adultitude. That’s what it was.

Katniss dragged her eyes away from the window and turned, leaning her back against the counter next to the sink and watched her sister as she read and dropped little golden o’s all over the pages of her book.

Sensing she was being observed, Prim looked up and smiled sweetly at Katniss who frowned back, not at all convinced that the smile wasn’t at least seventy five percent sarcastic. “Who the hell is he?” Katniss asked.

“Oh, that’s Peeta,” Prim said with a shrug and a dismissing handwave and dropped her eyes back down to her page.

“That’s great. Now what the hell is a Peeta?”

Prim sighed in an incredibly overly dramatic way before addressing Katniss. “Next door neighbour. Moved in a couple of months ago. He came around to introduce himself and dropped off some buns.”

“Buns?” Katniss’s tone was clipped. “And now he’s raking leaves?”

Prim shrugged again, “Yeah, apparently Mom was feeling all lonely and she asked him to stay for dinner. Peeta’s pretty much been doing the yardwork and stuff since then.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah, chores and food. That’s their thing.” Prim looked at Katniss for a beat and then picked her book back up effectively shutting down the conversation.

Katniss did _not_ like this turn of events. Shutting down conversation was _her_ thing and she was far from ready to end this particular chat. She turned to stare out the window again watching as the blonde neighbour bent down and scooped handfuls of brown, crispy leaves into a trashcan. Her finger tapped at the side of her mug, the chink of her nail against the ceramic being one of the few sounds in the kitchen along with the rustling of Prim’s book and the ticking of the clock.

The silence made her think. _‘Their thing,’_ Prim had said. Many questions flashed through Katniss’ mind at once, some of them making her feel queasy. Was ‘yardwork’ a euphemism for something more sinister? Sure, he was actually working on the yardwork now but what happened after? Was it warm cocoa and a quick screw on the kitchen table? Was it dinner followed by an evening session of hot guy taking advantage of a lonely widow? Also, how was this guy’s ass looking so good?

There was a shadow that hovered at the back of these thoughts. One that pressed more and more into the forefront of Katniss’ mind. How did Prim know all this information and not Katniss? Neither lived at home any more but Prim was normally at college in another district. Katniss only lived across town. There was a sting that rooted itself deep.

Instead of focusing on that, Katniss realigned her thoughts on the more unsavoury elements. She should never have thought about concept of a quick screw on the kitchen table. They all ate on that thing; innocent Prim was sat there now probably completely unaware of the genetic material that had been deposited all over it. As soon as Prim was done with breakfast Katniss would sanitise the shit out of that surface. Or burn the thing down. She hadn’t decided yet.

As Prim seemed to know everything, Katniss thought she would just go for it. “Are they-,” she began and stopped. The guy looked younger than her Mom. A lot younger. He could have been Katniss’ age. Maybe this Peeta wasn’t a sexual deviant taking advantage of an older woman. Maybe it was her Mom who was reaping the benefits of a younger male neighbour and in more ways than one.

Katniss began to worry that her tea was going to make a re-appearance. “Are they dating?” she asked and braced herself.

It seemed that the concept was just as unappealing for Prim as she let out a squeal. “Ewww, gross! No!” She stuck her tongue out and shook her head. “Apparently he doesn’t speak to his mother, they’re estranged or something. Turns out Mom’s an empty nester who needed someone to mother. Who’d have thought?”

Katniss was glad her face wasn’t towards Prim so that her little sister couldn’t see her expression. The very idea that a woman who couldn’t handle her children when they were younger and actually around was now pining their absence made her glower at the taps. “Yeah,” she said, “who’d have thought.”

“Why?” Prim asked, her voice light and breezy. “Are you interested?”

Katniss turned to face Prim once again, her eyebrows shooting into her hairline _once again._ Dammit, she was going to end up with premature wrinkles at this rate. “No,” Katniss said. “I just thought he looked a little young to be dating Mom.”

“He’s the same age as you.”

“Exactly. Too young.”

Prim tilted her head to her side and paused, looking at Katniss with thoughtful eyes. “You should go say hi.”

A snort left Katniss’ mouth and her upper lip curled, “I’m not going to say hi.”

“Ah you should,” Prim said, “he’s really nice. He co-manages a bakery in Merchant Square, coaches a junior wrestling team and paints in his spare time.” She stopped and considered something. “But he does make undrinkable tea.”

Katniss studied her little sister as she spoke. Prim’s hair was unbrushed, she was wearing her slouchy ducky pajama’s and there were pieces of cereal littering her lap. She didn’t look like a person who was putting in any effort of any kind. But still, if this strange neighbour wasn’t hanging around for their mom than maybe he was hanging around for someone else.

“You seem like you know a lot about him,” Katniss said. “Are you sure _you_ don’t want to go say hi?”

“We talk all the time when I’m here.”

“Uh-huh,” Katniss murmured. “Are you sure that _you’re_ not interested?”

A grin spread over Prim’s face. “No, Peeta’s lovely but not my type. I don’t think I’m his type either.” The grin became significantly more shit-eating. “I actually see him with someone a lot more… ragey.” And she looked at Katniss thoughtfully tapping her chin with a finger.

“I’m really not sure I know who you’re referring to,” Katniss retorted and glanced outside once more to see Peeta wiping a suspiciously muscular forearm against his brow.

She stepped towards the table and pulled out a chair opposite Prim and sat herself down. The ticking of the clock once again filled the silence of the room but it was a comfortable, familiar silence, one that wasn’t filled with the banging around of Katniss’ next door neighbours in their apartment. Coming home to stay the night had been Prim’s idea. She was back from college for the holidays and suggested that her and Katniss do one of their sister’s nights in.

Katniss gladly took up the offer of a sleepover. It meant that she would get a decent night’s sleep and spend time with her baby sister. It was win-win. But still, the unhappy feeling squirmed in her stomach and she couldn’t just will it away.

Prim, clearly used to Katniss’ pensive moods, just ignored her until Katniss spoke again. “How come you know all this anyway? Mom hasn’t said anything to me.”

It was like she knew she needed to tread carefully because when she next spoke, Prim’s voice was gentle. “I call Mom a lot when I’m not here and she just… talks to me. Like I said, she gets lonely.”

Katniss shifted in her chair. The truth was that she’d never given how her mother was feeling much thought. Katniss had moved out first and never looked back, packing as much of her stuff as she could into her car and adjusted to life in her one bed apartment with relish. That left Prim and their Mom with each other for company. When Katniss called or visited it was to speak to them both, spend time with them both. When Prim went to college Katniss made sure to call _her_ regularly but never really called her Mom to ask the same thing. Even now she was only staying because Prim was here.

“Besides,” Prim continued, “I made Mom invite Peeta over for dinner when I first got back. I was a bit worried that he was taking advantage but honestly, I think Mom is.”

“I thought you said they weren’t dating?”

Prim pulled the same disgusted face as she wore earlier. “They’re not but he does the yardwork, cleans out the gutters, fixes the car, makes the dinner _and_ bring around baked goods. He even painted the front door!”

Ah, Katniss thought. She knew that the paintwork looked too good to have been done by their mother.

“I think,” Prim whispered as though her voice was going to carry down the yard, “he’s like a house elf.”

Katniss snorted. “I don’t think house elves usually look like that.”

“Oh,” Prim said innocently, “look like what?”

Katniss rolled her eyes not caring to elaborate that Dobby definitely wasn’t blonde with broad shoulders and an ass you could probably bounce quarters off, when the back door creaked open.

Both women turned and Katniss saw the subject of their conversation step into the kitchen, his head down as he peeled off the garden gloves, blonde waves hanging over his forehead. “Hey Prim, I think that – oh!” He had looked up then and clocked Katniss. There was a moment of pause as he blinked a few times, clearly surprised to see her there.

A stab of hot irritation flowed through her. Last time Katniss checked this was her childhood home and her Mom was still _hers._ She had every right, more than him, to be sat at the kitchen table so she didn’t understand, or appreciate, his shock. Her voice was clipped when she spoke. “You’re letting the heat out.”

That seemed to break him from his stupor and he muttered an apology and he quickly stepped further into the kitchen closing the door behind him.

Katniss watched as Prim stood up from her chair, cereal o’s scattering on the floor as she did so and gave Peeta a hug which he wholeheartedly returned. “Mom was called into the hospital for an emergency last night so Katniss stayed over to keep me company,” she explained and beamed between the pair of them. “It was just like old times!”

She watched as Peeta smiled at her baby sister, the expression on his face one of warmth, and then watched as he slid his eyes from Prim’s face towards Katniss’ where the expression faltered a bit on meeting her scowl.

It didn’t seem to deter him though from stepping towards her with an outstretched hand. “Hi, I’m Peeta. From next door.”

“So I’ve heard.” It was muttered low but Prim shot her a warning glare from behind Peeta’s back and Katniss inwardly sighed. She stood up from the chair and reached out her own hand, shaking his. She’d had enough lectures from Prim over the years on her supposedly ‘anti-social behaviour’ and wasn’t ready to receive another one.

His hand was solid and the handshake was firm, the muscles in his arm flexing. Katniss saw his eyes briefly flicker down to her legs and she was very conscious that all she was wearing was an oversized jumper and her sleep shorts that were too short for random visitors. She looked across at Prim’s ducky pajamas with envy.

Peeta, rather annoyingly, seemed to take it all in his stride and when Prim insisted that he sit down while she got him a tea, he settled comfortably next to Katniss’s chair. She sat down with a slight huff that Prim hadn’t heard.

“I’ve heard a lot about you from your Mom and Prim,” Peeta nodded his head towards her sister as she heated up water. “She’s always talking about her big sister.”

Katniss offered up a tight smile, her thin attempt at civility. “Spend a lot of time talking to Prim, do you?”

He smiled at her again, “Well, when we’ve both been here, yes.”

“Do you come here often?”

Peeta’s smile stretched further and his blue eyes flashed, “Are you hitting on me, Katniss?”

“What?” Then she realised what she had said and her cheeks burned, “No, no. All I meant was-”

“I’m joking!” He winked at Prim as she placed a mug in front of him and Katniss watched as Prim winked back. She suddenly felt very out of place. Peeta, a complete stranger to her, was sitting contentedly in their kitchen like he belonged there and he seemingly belonged there a lot more obviously than Katniss did.

Prim bent over and prised Katniss’ mug from between clenched fingers and replaced it with a fresh one. Katniss looked at her sister with gratitude as the steam from her hot tea whirled upwards. “You’ll have to get used to Peeta’s idea of comedy,” Prim told her. “I keep saying he should stick to baking.”

“Hey! I’m hilarious!” he acted affronted but the smile on his face never left. “But it’s true, my buns are the best.”

Prim groaned and sat back down whilst Katniss felt herself blush again. Well, that much was true at least. She took a sip of her tea and out of the corner of her eye she saw Peeta do the same. Katniss glanced up and caught him looking at her, his eyes sweeping down over her flushing cheeks and beyond.

It was a quick glance but like before it seemed to rake over her body and once again she felt self-conscious in front of this stranger with her bare feet and legs. Katniss tried to surreptitiously pull at the hem of her sleep short which only served to draw more attention to what she was trying to cover.

Katniss saw him splutter on his tea and heard Prim ask if he was ok. “Yeah, just went down the wrong hole.”

She decided that her fist was about to go down another wrong hole if he didn’t stop staring and she wanted to tell him as much, but instead she stood, deliberately ignored him and turned to Prim. “I’m going to get dressed. I’ve got somewhere to be later.” Lies. But they didn’t know that.

“Oh, ok,” Prim replied but Katniss was already up, her hot tea in one hand as she walked towards the door pushing down all the strange feelings of irritation and discomfort and sadness that seemed to float around her head. She didn’t bother saying anything to Peeta, leaving him to enjoy _her_ kitchen, but before she reached the door she heard him speak.

“It was nice meeting you Katniss, hopefully I’ll be seeing a lot more of you.”

She turned. Peeta was directly opposite her, the mug to his lips and steam swirling about his face. He wore a little smile that she couldn’t decipher and his obnoxiously blue eyes were twinkling. He knew exactly what he was saying.

Before she exited the door, Katniss quickly took a side glance at Prim and, making sure her baby sister couldn’t see, gave Peeta the finger.


End file.
